By February 1988, I was doing six gigs a week with the Como's.
 |
| Melbourne Concert Hall (now Hamer Hall) |
We were making money juicing up wedding receptions in hotel ballrooms, kids shows in the Concert Hall, the Music Bowl for the elderly, busking ($40/hr each) and pub playing, and in the process we were getting our comic timing and teamwork semi-perfected and even writing some new material, some of which still lives on today in Covent Garden, greatly diluted.
 |
| 21st Birthday Party for my mate Muttly |
We won the Melbourne Busking Championships, where we met the Doug Anthony All Stars, who were hilarious but for some reason only came second or third. Rigged in our favour, probably; not that it counted for anything.
We were doing 3 hour shows every Thursday night at the famous Young & Jacksons pub, up in Chloe's bar. We packed them in, had special guests, we improvised the structure and developed our material. The pub was making bank and we were having a ball. The barman, Dennis from the states always begged us to play 'Old mAcdOnald" He absolutely loved that one. It was our newest number, a keeper.
Everybody had a good time - except for a girl called Fiona who told me after one super show : "That was shit-'ouse Poita." - She was jealous, and a bogan, and also sounds shit-'ouse by all accounts at the Melbourne Symphony where she still is.
Hung Le, our front man, now had in mind for us a journey. He'd picked the brains of one of the Doug Anthonys (Richard Fidler) and came to us with a plan:
"Edinburgh Fringe Festival in six months."
In May 1988: We flew to London.
 |
| Hung Le and Pete at Covent Garden 1988 |
By day three we were out of the youth hostel, moved into a tiny one bedroom flat and busking in Covent Garden.
 |
| Playing Bolero in Covent Garden - the inside pitch |
An immediate hit; and by the end of the month we had befriended the awesome street performer community after they'd done all their magic tricks on us, and showed us where the cheap beer was, we got to work on our show with a well known director, Nica Burns of the Donmar Warehouse who gave us some great ideas and shaped our setlist into a nice compact 45 minute classical spectacular with a few dick jokes, a pair of plastic maracas and a blonde wig.
 |
| Cardiff Newspaper |
A trip North to win the Cardiff International Street Entertainer Competition was a nice warm up for the bigger competition in London. A big scaffolding stage for the finals, radio microphones, huge crowd, and at the end on the scoreboard we'd won, but then they realized the math was wrong and the Kenyan Acrobats had more points. The crowd chanted: "Como, Como..." It was bedlam. It was rigged, but this time not in our favour.
 |
| 1st Heat of the Competition |
 |
| Click to enlarge. Read the article |
 |
| Covent Garden Crowd still building |
The BBC invited us on their new TV show: First Exposure. Shot in an enormous theatre, which was always the best format for our act, we brought the house down. Later in the year they played our segment again on The Best of First Exposure. Mum was actually in the audience and they had seated her next to the seat where host came to sit between his intros. Mum had glowing reports about the famous Arthur Smith.
I don't remember how we got the next gig - in Liverpool- as the opening act for the Finale of their Comedy Festival in their main theatre, but it was one of the craziest shows we've ever done. We started the act with the curtains opening suddenly revealing just our cellist in a spotlight on stage reading the paper, and he scrambled with his cello and began playing Pachelbel's Canon. We came in one by one until there were five of us onstage. Strong.
Some drunk businessman managed to get up onstage with us for 15 seconds, one of us said: "Dad!" everybody laughed, he staggered off and we kept going without missing a beat. I'll never forget it. People thought it was part of the act. Five guys on stage can be a powerful force.
August rolled around bringing into focus the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. Thanks to planning, leg work, a land line and some luck, we had a good venue booked, a two bedroom apartment that would fit 17 (everyone was welcome) and the entire press corps had been alerted. We hit the streets along with other London buskers including a young Eddie Izzard in a straight jacket. We did bits of our act while handing out fliers to drum up audiences for our theatre show. Most of the other acts had trouble getting people in. Too many acts.
 |
| The Flier |
Our daily theatre shows were packed to the rafters because word had gone around. Our first of three appearances at the notorious Fringe Club thrust us to the fore. We kept working on the act at home, particularly the dialogue fills, introductions and the running order. Audience participation was an ever expanding area for us. People loved it. Other acts came to watch us. We were very raw and loose, but underneath the swagger we had a pretty tightly rehearsed routine that could be adjusted on the fly without going off the rails.
We were constantly surrounded by girls. I was dating Petronella, the young English belly dancer busker who use to drive all the guys nuts on the dance floor.
 |
| Petronella and Peter |
Our flat was a constant party, but not in a normal way. We had people juggling fire, eating fire, guys dressing up in Petronella's bellydancing outfits.
 |
| Petronella, Hung, Pete O, Glen and George (I must have taken the picture) |
One night, one of our favourite characters, Doctor Stewart, a master of rap, mime and with more charisma than anyone I'd ever met, did some highlights of his street act, but in the nude.
 |
| Dr Stew |
 |
| Doctor Stewart and Hung at the pub |
 |
| On our way out of the house to busk at 'Fringe Sunday' |
We barely slept for three weeks.
Hung and I spent some time in the Greek Islands after the festival, and went to Rome for a week to stay with a couple of beautiful friends.
 |
| Rome: Anna & Antonella |
The Como Quartet received an offer for October to be musical guests in a Jim Henson show. Good money: 750 pounds sterling each for a day's work. It was a very prestigious gig. (wiki)
 |
| Como Quartet and Jim Henson Puppet 1988 |
Watch the Video
 |
| Hung taking some direction |
After 'the Muppets gig' the quartet went their separate ways for a break. Hung and I did a little time with our busker friends squatting. I headed down daily to the London Underground, busking solo to accumulate a bit more cash and then I spent the next few weeks traveling in Europe with a Eurail Pass for the train system, that Mum had given me for my 21st birthday which was coming up.
 |
| East Berlin 1988 |
Before Christmas, I flew out of Heathrow to Denver for a month long ski trip in Colorado and Utah with a couple of Aussies who brought my gear over. After that it would be back to University for 1989-90.
 |
| Peter in Colorado |
 |
| Pete and Steve Buxton in Utah |